Are there agents for makers (and if not, should there be?)
I'm trying to discover if a thing already exists or determine if it should.
I'm wondering if there is (or should be) a marketplace where one side is 'agents' (sellers) and the other is makers (builders, not content creators). This would work for small SAAS / widget builders, authors, course-creators, etc who have made something but want to keep building, not switch into marketer-mode for several months.
This acknowledges a few things:
1 - Some people are much better at one skill than the other. (So this would help both agents and makers).
2 - Hiring a salesperson or marketer is an up-front cost with no guarantee of success. This might not be viable in some low-cost markets, such as for low-cost software, courses, etc. (So this helps makers.)
3 - Finding ways to monetize a list or audience requires you to have a product which is an upfront investment of time / effort / money. (So this would benefit agents.)
Practically, the makers post a brief description of the item and the price (the standard T&C would show the commission) and sellers could advertise themselves as specialists in a niche. Either side could then 'shop' around for what they are looking for: makers look for agents in their niche and sellers look for products they think would sell well.
This would be a very transactional arrangement where there's a standard set of terms (T&C) for commission and duration of the agreement. Mechanically, it would operate like an affiliate code, so the difference is how people are brought together, not the technical aspects.
I know many people will say, 'but you need to be your own marketer', do it yourself, etc. But I think there are a lot of people who aren't great at selling (I am one and no, I don't want to buy your 'how to become a great marketer' course, thank you) but enjoy building stuff.
Similarly, some people are good at selling and want to share things of value with an audience but don't want to build something. Telling them to become developers and build their own app is equally unhelpful.
So, again, 1) does this exists and 2) if not, what do we think about this as an idea?
Use the poll below to let me know. (If it's been done, I'd love to know who's doing this so please leave a comment.)
What's the point of AI generated comments?
Why can't your target customers always find your product? - Experience sharing
Why I’m building an AI marketplace instead of another SaaS
The exact prompt that creates a clear, convincing sales deck
How does everyone setup their local computers for dev work?
The hardest part of building in public isn’t shipping.
Not familiar with anything that does this specifically, but there are plenty of platforms where influencers and marketers interact with buyers of their services.
I think the primary benefit here is the type of marketers attracted to the platform. Most makers I know are low budget, so the marketers this site attracts should be the same.
So I think the type of marketer (using the word "agents" makes more sense, since although they are marketers, it adds uniqueness to your product and denotes that this brand of marketers are very different, similar to how starbucks names servers "baristas") you want to attract would should be casual or freelancers just starting out rather than professional salaried workers.
This already exists on Fiverr and Upwork, but I think the primary benefit on your site would be to build more of a community with it by having a discussions and blogposts section, as well as allowing agents to sell their courses.
As for monetization, I think it should be similar to product hunt and craigslist (weird combination, I know) where the primary form of monetization is is advertisements.
I think this is important because there is almost no way you'll be able to monetize transactions between the two parties since they can just establish contact off site once they find each other.
Overall, I think this could work, but is going to require lots of work to get established because more general sites like upwork and fiverr exist.
Btw, if you've got the time, I'd appreciate it if you followed my product "Evoke" from my profile. It's still WIP, but I'd love to hear feedback on it once I release.
Good luck!